The Stop-Loss Program: Necessary Orders or a Back-Door Draft?

Guests:

Eugene Fidell is head of the Military Practice Group of the Washington law firm of Feldesman Tucker Leifer Fidell LLP, and president of the National Institute of Military Justice

Michael Noone is a professor of law at Catholic University and served 20 years as a judge advocate in the U.S. Air Force

Joshua Sondheimer is a San Francisco attorney who has represented military personnel who sued for having their contracts extended.

Last August, a National Guardsman filed the first court challenge to the federal government's stop-loss program. The case challenged a presidential order mandating that some members of the military remain on active duty beyond the dates they were scheduled to be discharged from service. The military defends the program as the only way to ensure there will be enough troops to safely conduct the on-going wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But those caught in the middle are doing all they can to end what they see as a back-door draft.

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